Effects of Frame Repetition Through Cues in the Online Environment

Research has shown that message frames can shape a reader’s subsequent judgments on political issues. In the online news environment, additional cues outside the story may be present that can affect the power of the frame. This online experiment investigates the role of repetitive cues in the framing processes using news editorials and their accompanying recommended headlines that repeat the editorial’s frame. Results suggest that regarding issue-related attitudes and emotions, consistent frame repetition reinforced the effects of the original article when the frame’s relevance to the readers was high but undermined the article’s impact when the relevance was low. Implications for framing studies and online news consumption are discussed.     

Aggregation,Clickbait and Their Effect on Perceptions of Journalistic Credibility and Quality

ABSTRACT

Many journalists and industry observers lament that aggregating news underneath sensational headlines will erode credibility and turn off readers. While some scholarly work has studied journalists’ perspectives of this practice, little has been done to understand what audiences think of aggregation and clickbait. This study uses published original and aggregated news articles as stimuli in two online experiments to test readers’ perceptions of news aggregation and clickbait. Aggregation itself has little effect on perceptions of credibility and quality; instead, writing proficiency is more closely linked to these perceptions. Results also suggest clickbait headlines may lower perceptions of credibility and quality.     

The Role of Engagement in Learning From Active and Incidental News Exposure on Social Media

The growing reliance on social media as news platforms may lead to more passive news consumption but also offers greater potential for engaging in news. This study investigates the role of engagement with news content on Facebook and Twitter between news exposure and current events knowledge. An online survey (N = 400) tests the relationships between social media news seeking, incidental exposure to news on social media, engagement in shared news content, cognitive elaboration, and current events knowledge. The results show that both active seeking of and incidental exposure to news on both sites are linked to engagement, which is linked to greater cognitive elaboration about the content. Furthermore, engagement mediates the relationship between both types of news exposure and cognitive elaboration. However, engagement and elaboration are not related to knowledge. These results indicate that the key role of social media in news content is not knowledge gain but the ability to engage users who may be passively receiving news on these sites. This study extends the cognitive mediation model of learning from the news in the context of current social media, with updated news consumption norms such as engagement with news on these sites, and incidental news exposure.     

“ALPHABET SOUP”: Examining Acronym and Abbreviation Style in Headlines

ABSTRACT

Through a content analysis and survey, this project explores the prevalence and clarity of acronyms in news headlines. Acronyms popular in a local newspaper were largely unknown to a sample of target readers. When asked about their reactions to unfamiliar published acronyms, about half said they would try to figure it out, and about one-third expressed negative emotions (e.g., frustration, annoyance). Additionally, most said unfamiliar acronyms affect their desire to continue reading, at least some of the time. These findings suggest that an increased focus on comprehension over brevity could help journalists better engage their readers.     

Incongruity in News Headings

In the rapidly changing news market, quality newspapers are searching for ways to combine established journalistic practices with attractive presentation of their newsprint. On internet news sites, attention-getting headlines are even more important in obtaining readership. This paper investigates the role of incongruity in selection of headings, and recall, recognition, and appreciation of selected news items. In Experiment 1, headlines were written on three incongruity levels: straightforward, ambiguous (trope), or stylistically deviant (scheme). In Experiment 2, news headlines were accompanied by either consistent or inconsistent photographs. Results of both experiments showed that heading incongruity enhanced information processing of news items.     

Antecedents of Incidental News Exposure: The Role of Media Preference,Use and Trust

ABSTRACT

The online environment has radically changed the way in which users consume, discover and manipulate news. The growing relevance of social media platforms and digital intermediaries for news sharing and consumption increase the likelihood of citizens to be exposed to online news even when they are not seeking it. This digital transformation fundamentally challenges the way online news use and exposure have been conceptualized and measured, affecting also to citizens’ knowledge about public affairs and politics. This article examines the factors that predict the probability to be an “incidentally exposed news user” online. Specifically, based on a representative US sample from the Pew Research Centre, this study analyses the role of media preference, use and trust. Findings indicate that beyond users’ demographics and loyalty, readers’ news preferences, uses and trust, specially of social media platforms, affect their probability to be incidentally exposed to news online. These results have important empirical and theoretical implications for understanding the connection between readers’ news consumption patterns and online exposure, intentional or incidental.     

Presidential framing in the Christine Blasey Ford and Anita Hill cases

ABSTRACT

Anita Hill’s testimony against Clarence Thomas in 1991 called attention to widespread sexual abuse in the US. Testimony from Christine Blasey Ford against Thomas Kavanaugh 27 years later underscored the lack of progress in its eradication. Using the cascading network activation model, this study identifies the episodic and thematic framing of both cases in relation to top-down influencers. A content analysis (N = 901) of US newspapers and TV networks showed episodic framing dominated coverage in both cases. Both Bush and Trump successfully emphasized their nominee as deserving of SCOTUS. Trump also significantly contributed to the negative framing of Blasey Ford. Thematically, Republican-led framing focused on American values and maintaining the rule of law, whereas Democratic-led framing concentrated on raising awareness to the systemic problem of sexual abuse and threat the nominee posed to progressive rights. News coverage included challenging both presidents, but only for a total of 15.9% for Trump and 10.7% for Bush. On the other hand, Hill was challenged in 40.5% and Blasey Ford in 73% of news coverage. In sum, even with strong opposition, the cascade model’s success indicates that White House messaging continues to usurp social justice issues.     

The gods are drinking milk! Word‐of‐mouth diffusion of a major news event in India

The objective of this study is to explore whether the US media overemphasized recalled Chinese products in 2007 and, if so, how news coverage in the US media differed from that of the Chinese media. By using a framing analysis of the coverage in two US media and two Chinese media, this study pursues answers to these questions. After comparing the news coverage of the recalled Chinese products and a real world indictor, this study found that neither US nor Chinese media mirrored the real world phenomenon as it was. By comparing news coverage of the issue in The New York Times and The Associated Press with China Daily, and The Xinhua News Agency, the study found that news coverage of the recalled issues differed significantly in terms of the sources used, the nationality of the source, the dominant frames employed, and the attribution of responsibility for the problems. In particular, Chinese media more frequently employed government officials as their main sources, which inherently increased the use of thematic frames. By contrast, US media often used episodic frames. Likewise, American media approached the issues using ‘Customers' Worries’ and ‘Broken System’ frames, whereas Chinese media often attempted to defend the quality of Chinese products and criticized Western media for exaggerating the issues. Owing to the news framing process, US audiences might have acquired more negative images of Chinese products and China in general. By contrast, their Chinese counterparts might have experienced increased antipathy and distrust concerning the American media.     

Self-efficacy,information-processing strategies,and acquisition of health knowledge

Informed by the Cognitive Mediation Model of media learning, this study explores how self-efficacy and information-processing strategies jointly impact the learning of health knowledge. Using survey data (N=1409), the study examines the roles that self-efficacy, motivation of media use, news attention, and elaboration play in acquiring knowledge about swine flu during the 2009 global pandemic crisis. Results support the hypothesized relationships among self-efficacy, motivation, attention to and elaboration of swine flu news, and knowledge about the flu. Implications of the findings to advance the research in mediated cognitive learning are discussed.     

Role regulation and normative expectations: the discursive erasure of Middle Eastern forced migrants in U.S. news outlets

ABSTRACT

This thematic analysis of 510 news articles – spanning the leftist-rightist ideological spectrum – examines media rhetoric surrounding President Trump’s 27 January 2017 Executive Order (EO) 13769 barring immigrants and refugees from U.S. resettlement. In this article, I examine how both liberal and conservative news media rhetoric reinforce respectability politics that create a hierarchy of victimhood for those affected by the EO. Interrogating U.S. civil society’s discursive construction of the forced migrant, I expose expectations for appropriate roles for these communities seeking asylum, though these roles are often veiled by normative U.S. mythology. As this analysis illustrates, the news media articles’ discursive erasure of Syrian, Iranian, Sudanese, Iraqi, Libyan, Somali, and Yemeni immigrants and refugees elide forced migrant self-representation and neglect the political/historical reasons for fleeing from their nations of origin.     

Opportunity or risk? How news organizations frame social media in their guidelines for journalists

Guided by regulatory focus theory and framing, the present study analyzes how U.S. and British mainstream news organizations (N = 12) frame the current social media environment in their social media guidelines. The results indicate that news organizations dominantly frame the new environment as a risk to guard against, warning of the possible harm to their reputations and journalism norms such as accuracy and objectivity (prevention-focused), rather than as an opportunity to actively take advantage of (promotion-focused).     

Global risk,domestic framing: coverage of the North Korean nuclear test by US,Chinese, and South Korean news agencies

Comparative framing analysis on coverage of the North Korean nuclear test in the US Associated Press, Chinese Xinhua, and South Korean Yonhap news agencies identified four major media packages. First, a common ‘threat’ frame dominated coverage by all news agencies, represented by reconfiguration of geopolitics and an emphasis on global cooperation in both perception and resolution of the nuclear test. Second, with each nation positioning itself differently in the world power system, the issue was notably domesticated in the news, with Associated Press connecting the nuclear test to the broader ‘War on Terror’ framework found frequently in US media, Xinhua promoting a negotiation principle in handling the issue, and Yonhap framing the test with a ‘Cold War’ perspective. In all three cases, national political interests exerted important impacts on the construction of frames. The compatibility of the seemingly opposite packages (globalizing vs. domesticating) signifies both intensification of worldwide social relations and reassertion of national stands. This finding lends support to the transformationalist view of globalization, which suggests that the nation state still matters in a globalized world, but is being recontextualized in a more complex world of politics and culture.     

Emotionally Charged: Exploring the Role of Emotion in Online News Information Seeking and Processing

This study examines how news stories framed in terms of discrete emotions (anger, fear, hope) influence online news message processing and information seeking. Results revealed that participants who read the approach emotion stories (anger and especially hope) spent more time on the story page than those who read the avoidant emotion (fear) story. These two emotional frames also differentially affected the information that people selected post-exposure in emotion-consistent ways. Overall, the findings deepen our understanding of the role that the emotional framing of news stories plays in determining how consumers respond to and selectively engage with online news content.     

The Second-Level Agenda-Building Function of the Xinhua News Agency

Mediated public diplomacy scholarship investigates the manner in which governments attempt to shape the framing of its leaders, people, and foreign policy in other nations’ media outlets. A growing body of literature identifies agenda-building efforts by these governments who often use state-sponsored media platforms to promote some issues and attributes as more salient than others. The current study provides a unique examination of China's use of its Xinhua News Agency as an information subsidy for US news outlets. Study results point to a limited transfer of issue salience between the Chinese news agency and the US news outlets. Non-significant findings were identified regarding attribute agenda building. The results of the study identify a significant intermedia agenda-setting effect between the US news outlets, with The New York Times serving as a conduit between Chinese and US news agendas. Results are discussed in the context of global political public relations and mediated public diplomacy scholarship.     

Crafting the news

Courses: This activity could be used in a basic public-speaking course to demonstrate messaging and the development of the three pillars of public speaking: content, organization, and delivery. In a basic communication course, this activity would help illustrate the process of communication (sender, receiver, feedback, channel, etc.). A mass communication class can use this activity to discuss the power of news outlets and social media while digging into mass communication theory (agenda setting, computer mediated communication, framing, etc.).

Objectives: Through collaboration with teammates, small groups of students will develop a three- to five-minute news segment that will be posted on YouTube upon completion. Through social-media distribution of the YouTube link, this news clip must attract a certain number (the final number can be determined by the instructor) of viewers in a specified time limit. Student participants will be responsible for identifying valid sources and compiling credible information pertaining to their news topic while also illustrating effective competency in speech content, organization, and delivery by preparing a presentation that is trustworthy and interesting, concise and clear, and presented with energy and charisma while conducting proper vocal and body delivery techniques. The “big question”: can the group create a credible, clear, concise, coherent news broadcast and distribute the finished project to a social-media outlet in the hopes of gaining a certain number of viewers?     

The audience for television news interview programs

An experiment investigated if graphic censorship disclaimers affect memory or thought elaboration for television news stories of the 1991 Persian Gulf war. Viewer assessment of the credibility of censored news also was considered. Subjects listed their thoughts about each story, and their memory was tested as recognition latency. Subjects who rated the credibility of censored news as moderate scored highest on the memory task, but listed the fewest number of negative mentions about the government named as censor in the stories. Under some conditions, results show that the more viewers thought about the source of the censorship, the lesser they remembered images from the stories.     

The last refuge of media persuasion: news use,national pride and political trust in China

This study examines theoretical connections among three variables, each in its own way engendering profound political implications for the Chinese society today: news use, national pride, and political trust. We focused on the impact of ‘positivity bias in news’ and advanced a theoretical model on the basis of framing theory to address the dynamics of propaganda and its persuasive effects. Using data from the World Value Survey, we found: (1) news use in general, television news viewing in particular, was positively associated with political trust and national pride; (2) impact of news use on political trust disappeared once national pride was statistically controlled; and (3) intensity of national pride moderated the bivariate relationship between news use and political trust. The effect of party propaganda intended to consolidate political trust in China was contingent upon both one's affective ties to the state and the form of news media regularly consumed.     

After the spillover effect: news flows and power relations in Chinese mainstream media

Through a case study on the news flow of an online protest in China, this study explores how the power relations among the mainstream media affect, and are affected by, the spillover effect of news. Even though the Internet does serve as a catalyst to initiate alternative voices that otherwise wouldn't be heard in the established media, the results reveal that the power structure inherent in the mainstream media (particularly within their online versions) such as bureaucratic ranks and institutional ties with party organs, plays a significant role in shaping the trajectory of news flow and media framing strategies. The Internet compensates for the disadvantage of the lower-level media that are short of political resources, while the higher-level media tend to rely on the political capital to exercise their influence. At the same time, the media with more political resources have become increasingly intrepid in challenging the state. Such a dynamic takes place in the context of the changing state-media relations that have seen the authoritarian state shift its information control from a totalitarian mode to a practical one, even though the latter may open up a space for flow of information that can sometimes undermine state power.     

Consumers’ Willingness to Share Personal Data: Implications for Newspapers’ Business Models

ABSTRACT

As people’s willingness to pay for digital news remains low, this article investigates whether people would be willing to share personal data as a new currency for accessing news. Increasingly, news organizations collect personal data and track cross-media consumption to build detailed knowledge about and (re)connect with digital news consumers. This article presents the results of an industry-driven big data project that allows news organizations to engage with their audience more deeply by suggesting personalized content recommendations, serving targeted advertising and/or improving the user experience. It presents the concept of the datawall, where the user pays with their data, and delivers new insights into the challenges facing data-driven business models.     

How Young,Uninsured Americans Respond to News Coverage of Obamacare: An Experimental Test of an Affective Mediation Model

This experiment integrated theory from multiple domains to examine how aspects of news coverage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and differences in participants’ cognitive and emotional contingent conditions interact to shape attitudes and behavioral intentions toward health care legislation. Using a sample of uninsured young adults (N = 1,056), we tested an affective mediation model, which assessed the mechanisms through which media frames, exemplar case studies, and individual predispositions affect this type of news consumer. Results demonstrate the complicated pathways through which emotions mediate the effects of news coverage of ACA based on political predispositions, the need for orientation toward the health care issue, and the influence of equivalency framing in the form of example cases. These findings contribute to a more nuanced explanation of the causal mechanisms underpinning framing effects of public policy news coverage on an understudied population. The need for further examination of emotion along with cognition when investigating framing effects of public policy news is discussed, and the importance of exemplar cases as a significant manifestation of the effects equivalence framing is highlighted.